PM’s defenceless against tide of sleaze and Brexit
WHO benefits? That’s always the key question when a crime or political crisis takes place.
Obviously Gavin Williamson is the winner of the “Pestminster” sexual harassment scandal.
The ambitious Tory chief whip, who has risen from nowhere in seven years, recommended himself for the more powerful job of Defence Secretary after Michael Fallon resigned.
Theresa May is such a weak Prime Minister that she could only accept his support. Older ambitious men in the Cabinet, appalled at his audacity, cannot contain their jealousy. That’s the men.
Women may have won a qualified result because cleaning out the political stable, as Ruth Davidson put it, of dirty old men who feel entitled to take advantage of younger women does not end sexual harassment.
When the fall-out from the grotesque Harvey Weinstein allegations collided with the world of British politics, a serious problem was in danger of being reduced to gossipy tittle-tattle about knee-touching.
It took the grave claims by Labour activist Bex Bailey of a covered-up rape to underscore what is at stake.
We might be at a turning point in public life, but the fight for equality and against sexual harassment will be a constant battleground.
The opposition are surely winners, if they have the strength of will to seize the prize.
Yes, the PM is weakened, but Brexit, the issue that defines our political destiny, steams on.
Fallon’s resignation overshadowed two important developments in the Brexit debate on Wednesday. Firstly, the opposition managed to force a vote that ought to bind the Government into revealing the impact assessment of Brexit on 58 sectors of the economy.
The statistics will spell out the devastating effect of this act of national self-sabotage.
The same day, the Electoral Commission announced they were opening an investigation into Aaron Banks, the millionaire funder of UKIP and the Leave EU campaign.
Russia attempted to manipulate the results of the US and French presidential elections. Why on Earth would it not seek to diminish one of the world’s leading nuclear powers and undermine the European trading bloc by interfering with the Brexit vote?
But whether Russian propagandists slewed the Brexit result is now almost academic.
There is a sense of resignation across the UK that Brexit will now happen, when the time is opportune to stop it.
There is no sign of Labour derailing the Brexit process.
Keir Starmer shows signs of being able to do it and the SNP would willingly join them in the act. Jeremy Corbyn is the drag anchor.
The Tories are in a mess but that is no guarantee that Corbyn can win.
But to recall Tony Blair, if they can’t take this lot apart in the next few years, they shouldn’t be in politics at all.